Across Troubled Waters
by Maige
Summary: A short summary of the discovery of Madeline's pregnancy, coupled with forewarnings of Arthur's doubtful attitude towards the whole event. Canon with Shag Tag. For L-Lover.


Disclaimer: I do not own Hetalia

Gssh, I'm so sorry for taking so long with these. Busy with other sites, no inspiration for writing...puh, I have no good excuses for lengthening this out. I was hoping to get all of the Shag Tag gifts out this month...but I doubt that will happen.

Regardless, here's the second one for L-Lover, who requested a simple MapleTea piece centering around Arthur and Maddie discussing having a family. This one'll be somewhat shorter than the rest of the gifts and will sort of be related to Shag Tag. I hope everyone's okay with the little quirks I added to this one-shot...I couldn't help but think of this when L-Lover suggested this particular content.

Enjoy.

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><p>It was on a December morning, the day after Christmas (a day that both Arthur and Maddie were familiar with as Boxing day) when England was awoken in something akin to a rather frightful manner.<p>

He was still getting used to the Canadian climate. Maddie had been receiving strange weather for this time of the year, mostly rain, but that didn't stop from the fact that it was bloody freezing. Plus, it had snowed the day before, which simply added to the freezing temperatures.

Because of this, he was literally in a ball of blankets and sheets and comforters when the noise of someone sounding like they were retching woke him up.

Eyes shooting open, Arthur shot upwards and looked wearily to across the hallway, where a thin ray of light could be seen from underneath the closed bathroom door. He looked to the clock, which told him it was a mere three in the morning, and looked back to the hallway. After a second of listening, he decided that it was most definitely someone throwing up.

With that realization, he was not tired anymore.

Arthur darted off from the bed after a maddening moment of trying to untangle himself from the sheets, and scrambled out of the room and to the bathroom, his groggy mind a jumbled mess of hysteria and worry.

He stopped in front of the door, speaking quietly, though somewhat hysterically. He didn't think of opening the door, on the note of wanting to be decent about whatever was happening. "Madeline? Maddie? Luv, are you alright?"

Silence on the other end of the wooden object. Then came the sound of someone shuffling around a bit, and something that could have been Madeline's answer.

A moment after and Arthur could clearly hear the young girl dry-heaving, harsh barks that terrified the Brit.

Never minding his need to be a gentleman, Arthur slammed the door open and took in the situation before him. Maddie was kneeling on the floor, crouched over a bile-filled toilet bowl. Her dry heaving had apparently stopped once Arthur stepped onto the scene. She slowly swung her head towards Arthur, her state of appearance causing her English lover to hold back a wince.

Dark circles were painted delicately underneath her eyes. Her hair was strung over her face in messy tangles, most glued to her perspiration covered cheeks and forehead. She looked up wearily at Arthur and smiled sheepishly, weakly. When she spoke her voice came out more as a croak.

"S-Salut, Arthur...I-I'm sorry, did I wake you up? D..._désolé..._I didn't mean to."

"Don't apologize over something like that," Arthur snapped, immediately regretting it when the younger nation shrunk back. He slowly dropped beside her, looping an comforting arm around Maddie's shoulders and bringing the trembling girl close.

"Now, do you know what brought this on? Is there something happening in your country that could have caused this? Or did you eat something that didn't agree with you?"

"I...I don't know," Maddie muttered, immediately leaning against him once his arm was wrapped around her. She looked off to the side absently. "Can we talk about this in the bedroom, s'il vous plait? The smell is making me nauseous again..."

England nodded agreeably, reaching forward to gingerly close the toilet lid and flush it off its contents, before cautiously helping Madeline to her feet and aiding her back to their room. Once there he pulled his former colony back under the warmth of the comforter again, holding the ill nation in a protective embrace.

"Alright...now speak to me, luv."

"Well," Canada started uncertainly, once more drawing her eyes away from Arthur's, "It isn't something in my homeland...there hasn't been anything big enough to make me sick, not like this...and food-wise...I'm not sure. Though, Arthur, I've been feeling nauseous in the mornings for the last few days...it's only been this morning when I actually got sick from it."

Arthur's monstrous eyebrows drew together in concern. "And why didn't you tell me you were feeling sick before?"

"I'm sorry." Not really an answer, but Arthur doubted he could get the real one of out of her.

Sighing, England brought her closer until it would seem like their bodies could meld into one and began to run his fingers through her tangled, golden curls, pondering on this. It was extremely rare for a nation to acquire an illness when there was nothing going on that could cause them to become ill, unless it was brought on by emotion.

Could these be more after shocks from what happened with Russia? Arthur had assumed that the last of those had deceased last month. Of course, he could be wrong.

He looked down at Madeline. From the smooth, even breathing coming from her, she had obviously fallen back into a peaceful slumber. Whatever had struck her moments before had departed, and for the moment she seemed to be in a relatively serene state.

After surveying her, Arthur decided that he would once more worry about that bridge when ( if ) they came to it, and followed her into sleep.

* * *

><p>There were no more incidents of vomiting, though Maddie still sometimes complained of feeling ill in the mornings. As long as she didn't move around too much in the hours of dawn, or eat anything heavy in the night before, she was alright.<p>

Still, the constant feeling of sickness was worrying Arthur to no end. What if Russia had done something to her that could have caused this? A virus of sorts? It would have been a slow-acting one, to be sure, but it could still have been a possibility.

A mere three days later he was about ready to bring Madeline to the hospital, no matter what excuses or protests she would come up with, when the Canadian trodded down the stairs into the living room, looked at Arthur with shellshocked eyes. In her hand was an object that Arthur could not make out.

After the painfully slow interrogation of making Madeline let out what was wrong, she brought up the object in hand, which turned out to be a home pregnancy test, one that held a plus sign in the result window, and confided to Arthur that she was pregnant.

Arthur took no time in blacking out on the spot.

* * *

><p>"How in the name of Victoria did this happen?" Arthur demanded as he paced back and forth across the span of the room. After awaking, he and Madeline had switched positions, the older country deciding to roam around like a restless animal, the younger sitting meekly on the couch.<p>

Maddie didn't respond.

Arthur paused and turned to her, running a hand through his shaggy mop of hair. "How? We did use protection, did we not?"

"N-non, we didn't," Canada answered meekly, folding her hands gingerly on her lap. "When...it happened, it really was out the blue...I-I suppose none of us bothered to think about it..."

"How did this happen?" Arthur repeated, as if not hearing what Madeline said. He resumed his pacing. "We...how are we going to...this is...just..._how?"_

"Arthur."

"What are we going to do?"

"Arthur."

"How would this even work? There has never been a case of a nation becoming pregnant, except, of course, for those few of us who are female, but then those bred new countries, such as Greece, so how would this - "

"_Arthur!"_

He stopped again by the surprisingly display of assertiveness placed into the Canadian's cry. Arthur turned his gaze back once more to her and was startled to see that she was near tears. His expression softening, he made his way over to her and took a seat beside Madeline, taking her hands tenderly in his own.

"I know, Madeline. I should calm down...I should be tending to you instead of my own worries - "

"That's not what I interrupted you for," Maddie interjected, regarding England crossly. Soon enough though, her features naturally melted into concern. Her fingers tightened on England's. "The way you're talking about this..are...are you upset?"

Arthur gaped at her, the worry Madeline's large, dewy eyes causing his heart to clench. "O-of course not, luv! I know I sounded like I was about to go off my rocker, but in no way am I upset...more surprised than anything..."

"Do you regret it?" was Maddie's next question. Her violet orbs practically bored into Arthur's.

"I...again, of course not," Arthur said, speaking carefully. "What about you, though? How are you feeling about this?"

There was obviously something else, simply in the way he responded, that told Maddie that he had more to say about it then that. But she ignored it for now, finally bringing her soul-wrenching eyes away from her English lover. A ghost of a smile passed over her face. "To be honest...I was sort of terrified when I saw that the test was positive...but at the same time I'm excited.

I mean, I know we've only been together for a few months...that, coupled with everything else that had happened, to some this seems like it would be too soon...and it even may be too soon to make a decision over anything, especially considering I'm probably only a week or two in...but even now I know that I couldn't bear getting rid of something...someone...growing inside me."

A rather fond expression passed over the blonde's pale, smooth facial features. Her spidery eyelashes dropped halfway and she dipped her hand, hesitating briefly before pressing a hand to her stomach. Arthur remained silent as he watched her.

"A few days after beginning to feel sick to my stomach I suspected this...that's why I decided to finally take the test...and all those days I could only think about what would happen if I was pregnant...just imagining how the baby will grow...you know, about right now, he or she's still a bundle of nerves...it isn't until a month when the embryo beings to show itself..."

Madeline's gaze rose. Her eyes were shining with unshed tears. Arthur still couldn't speak.

"I'm...I'm already so happy that this happened...I'm happy that it happened with you."

With that, the tears spilled her lower lashes, and Arthur instinctively brought Maddie into his arms, continuing to keep his mouth shut as he held the crying yet ecstatic blonde against him. After a while, without even realizing it, he began to cry along with her.

A million things were running through his minds.

As with everyone he had done with Madeline, there was no regrets.

But there were doubts.

Hesitance.

The hesitance that one usually gets whenever having a first child. An actual child. Not just a colony to attend to.

There was terror. Terror towards the soon to be growing child..._his _child...that was growing in the womb of the blonde girl before him. Something that was truly a part of him.

And yet, he knew he had to keep these worries aside.

Madeline was more than liable to go through nine months of hell, unless pregnancy was kind on her, and she had already gone through a period of hell...once again, he had to put all of his focus onto her. There was no need to put any stress on her by sharing his own worries.

So he kept to himself about his own rushing emotions and parted from her, laughing when Maddie pointed out the fact that he was crying too, with such a comically astounded look that he could not help but burst into laughter.

His laughter seemed contagious, and Maddie joined him soon after.

A month later they sat on that grassy hill.

Maddie's stomach was still quite flat. She had practically drowned herself in books about the topic of pregnancy, in which most said that the inital baby bump could come anywhere between two to three months, or more. The Canadian had taken up a habit of touching her stomach often.

Arthur rarely touched her stomach, though Maddie never seemed to notice this.

On that hill he questioned her on if she regretted anything. She smiled and said no, and laid her hand on her tummy.

England pulled her closer, for both the sake of having the girl near to him, and for the warmth that came off of her body. The chill was cutting through his old bones.

He still had no regrets either.

Just worries.

Painstaking worries that crashed and collided throughout his scattered brain.

But...like everything else, they would cross that bridge when they came to it.

And when they would, Arthur was sure he would be able to figure out the right line of thought.

With Madeline by his side, he was positively certain of it.

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><p>...Queen of Corn was right. But, I'm liking my cheesy endings...in fact, I prefer them. With the novels I've been recently reading, this is a welcome for me, considering that most of the ones I've been reading have been making me want to write something depressing.<p>

Anyhow, I hope L-Lover liked it, and everyone else that read this liked it. Sorry about the lack of discussing between the two, but...I want to save that for another. This was pretty much just filler, this little side story, but I still hope it's...erm...at least passable.

Reviews would be wonderfully appreciated.


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